money and subservience

(An excerpt from Robert Reich’s Substack)

       Think of all Trump’s moves—whether controlling the Fed, or occupying American cities, or unleashing ICE on immigrants, or imposing import taxes (tariffs) on American consumers, or attacking American universities and museums, or shaking down CEOs, or punishing his “enemies”—as motivated by an unquenchable thirst to accumulate bargaining power over every other actor and institution in the world.

      The more bargaining power he has, the more he can extort from them the things he most cares about: money and subservience.

      We are dealing with a sociopath who is continuously seeking new ways to force others to reward him with personal wealth and total domination.

      Money is not enough. He relishes the submission of others. He craves obsequiousness, groveling servility and ass-kissing. He detests criticism. He wants to get even. He wants a Nobel Prize and his face carved on Mount Rushmore.

      His goal is to achieve, or be perceived to have achieved, omnipotence.

      Trump’s art of extortion involves finding things that other powerful actors and institutions depend on—research funding for Harvard (and other universities); access to the American market for Canada (and other countries); avoidance of environmental regulations for Big Oil; access to the government for Big Law; federal funding and freedom to operate without federal troops for mayors of “blue” cities and governors of “blue” states; supplies and components from abroad for big corporations.

      Then he uses that dependence as pressure points to extort more money and submission.

      Control over the Fed gives Trump way more tools for extortion. With control over interest rates, he can get America’s biggest corporations and the world’s biggest nations to bend to his will. With control over the big banks, he can get Wall Street to submit to his whims.

      Normal policy debates are over what’s good for the public (hence “public” policy). But we’re no longer in a world of normal policy debate. The central question inside the Oval Office, and among Trump’s enablers in the White House and Congress, is what will enrich Trump and strengthen his dominance over everyone and everything else.

      The most important public policy debate we ought to be having is how to peacefully and lawfully rid America and the world of this menace.